Heritage Action blasts ‘clean’ funding bill as vote for ‘amnesty’

by Ben Kamisar - 02/24/15 3:19 PM ET

The prominent conservative group Heritage Action for America is coming out strongly against legislation that funds the Department of Homeland Security without halting President Obama’s immigration action, deriding it as a vote for “amnesty.”

The conservative group, which has often sparred with GOP leaders in Congress, said it will lobby senators to vote against the new funding bill, which Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) unveiled on Tuesday.

“Further exposing the blatant hypocrisy of Senate Democrats is no substitute for stopping President Obama’s dangerous and unlawful amnesty,” Heritage Action CEO Michael Needham said in a statement.

“As the majority leader said last year, the power of the purse is the ‘only tool’ Congress has to rein in executive overreach. As such, Heritage Action will key vote against any DHS bill that would allow for the funding of the President’s unconstitutional amnesty.”

Key vote scorecards are a popular way for political groups to pressure lawmakers. Groups will often tout their rankings during election years. Heritage Action previously scored the House bill that funded DHS while halting Obama’s immigration actions as a “key vote” in January.

After multiple Democratic filibusters of a bill that defunded Obama’s actions, McConnell has moved to split the issue into two separate bills — one to fund the agency and one to defund Obama’s 2014 immigration action.

That way, Congress can fund the agency while forcing Democrats to take a tough vote on whether they support the president on this issue.

Without action from Congress, DHS funding will expire on Saturday.

Tags Mitch McConnell